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Parents and family, pre-birth
Netha Darl Spy and her husband Amdis had returned with their little son, Light, to a near-abandoned town covered in ashes after a long adventurous journey. Auria had been nearly destroyed a few months earlier when a nearby volcano erupted and the small family’s home had suffered same fate as most of the town’s buildings. From the remaining and struggling survivors they learnt of those that had taken their escape from the town as a passing-by cargo ship stopped by to look for survivors and that Netha’s parents were gone with them. In the remains of their relatives’ home, all she could find was her mother’s many journals and notes, an iron cane and the sad remains of her father’s dog along with some moldy and ashen bread loafs.

They mourned the loss of their home and feared for their loved ones and friends before they began to aid in the reconstruction of the town. There was no time to dwell too long in the past. It would take many years before Auria would be more than a work in progress while the jungle nearby slowly reclaimed lands lost. Amdis and Light lend their hands and Xitian abilities to aid in construction and cleaning up while Netha did her best in the mines with providing building materials. However, once Netha learnt she was expecting a second child it became a priority for them to find or restore a proper home for the growing family.

Amdis, a blacksmith by trade, thus begun restoring and moving the remains of the smithy he once worked in. With some help from his son and the townsfolk they had soon expanded it into a small home. All this while Netha was dwelling in dark thoughts and grief as she waited for the child to be born. She held her parents very dear and had lost them before. After this long time with no word from them she feared the worst; that she had lost them again and this time, for good. That is why the family’s second baby boy, born in the middle of fall, came to carry the name Caesar. Named after his grandfather.

The years that passed after Caesar’s birth consumed his parents with joy, hard work, grief and of course a healthy dose of some happiness here and there. One of these moments of happiness were the news that Netha was expecting her third child.

Birth
In spring, a few years after the Caesar’s birth, a healthy baby girl was born. Her ashen locks and at the time deep-red eyes convinced her mother to continue what she’d begun with the girl’s older brother and named the girl Zaira, after the girl’s grandmother Zarkaylia. It had been a tough birth on her mother who fell ill over some time afterwards, leaving her older brothers to aid in taking care of the newborn.

0-5 years old
Zaira grew up in the family’s home and its nearest surroundings. Most of the family helped to take care of the young baby girl, her parents’ occupations being demanding on them and their bodies and raising three kids not the easiest task with a growing town on the rise alongside them. Light had to care for his younger siblings a lot and it didn't take long to realize that Zaira was an unruly child, downright violent, and energetic. Far too often Light had to part his younger siblings or Zaira and another kid as they broke into open fights. Already early in life Zaira often got scolded for her behavior. What first was quite cute for a young child had at the age of four grown occasional grumbles and mutters from her oldest brother, even though he was still in an age where he enjoyed some playful fighting now and then with his beloved sister. Her mother, Netha, had always held great compassion and understanding, thus didn't discourage Zaira’s spirit too much at start though she always condemned Zaira if she hurt herself or, especially, anyone else. Something Netha did very thoroughly the times she did.

Zaira loved her parents. Her mother was always warm and tender, timid, while stern when needed. She smells of bath oils and dust and is soft and cuddly to sit with. Her hair’s very soft and well cared for, her hands as coarse as Zaira’s father’s. Her father is stern and smells of sweat and ashes, strong and quiet. He can lift Zaira with ease and let her fly. He’s not as warm as her mother and bit more distant. He demands respect and had always kept teaching her about her Xitian heritage and what makes a good warrior.

When Zaira was still just a little girl, about four years old, her older brothers found a small litter of kittens. It was the tailor’s cat that had had kittens some weeks before and thinking of their sister, Light and Caesar brought Zaira to see the cute little miracles. Zaira, who’d never seen anything the like, played and patted the kittens and their mom with joy and laughter for weeks to come and could barely be dragged away from them to go home for dinner each night. Speaking of this new wonder the way only a four year old can, which is to say constantly and in no means in a way her parents could fully understand, led the family to adopt one of the kittens for her. The cat was named Little, as that was what four year old Zaira had first called and kept calling kittens. As she grew she’d grow to love animals and brought home bugs, frogs, a stray dog and to not mention others’ cats that she thought were homeless, to care for. All of which of course mostly had to be let out or returned again.

At the age of five her parents were expecting her to show sign of her abilities as Xitian any day. That the girl had been born with it they already knew as Nether had effect on her. A very effective way to calm a Xitian baby is to touch them carefully and lightly with Nether and Zaira had been no exception. And sure enough, in the kitchen one day during a fight of the wills between Zaira and Light the small girl was upset enough to suddenly and without warning produce a blast of fire. Not only setting her poor older brother’s socks on fire but also the kitchen. Luckily, a family with one half-blood Xitian with skills with Fire and three full-blood Xitians didn't have too much problems in taking care of the fire and poor exhausted Zaira who’d fainted on the spot. Since that day, her parents begun to train her in her abilities and let her practice with her brothers.

Already early on in life, her mother and brothers told her stories of her grandparents. Not just because she was named after her grandmother or because Netha missed them very dearly, but also because they were simply exciting and good stories to tell. Zaira quickly came to admire both. Her grandfather, the Xitian multi-man who tamed a beast and went on man-hunt to save said beastly wife, and her grandmother, the fierce determined warrior that slays all in her path with cunning and strength without needing powers hiding deep beyond the color of her eyes.

Zaira learnt of the slavery this way. She learnt the harsh reality regarding her own red eyes and her abilities and she learnt of the Veld war and the Realms. She learnt that since before she was even born there’d raged a long and terrible civil war on a continent far far away that is named and called the Mainland. She learnt of the Purges and the intended annihilation of her own kind. She had to learn, that she and her family are unwanted beings in this Realm. That long before even Light was born there was already whole nations cursing her existence. With some few exceptions. And she listened, with awe and fear. She was a child and they were stories, tales. They were from a world she didn't know and couldn't even imagine, herself spending her whole life so far in a small remote town a whole sea apart from it. But the tales of Purges and teaches of racism came with many warnings from her parents and she quickly learnt to be weary of using her powers where she’s not safe and that her eyes give her away.

6-7 years old
Zaira was taught the basic things, literacy and basic math, some history and certainly to read. With her parents working hard and her oldest brother starting his apprenticeship they all helped out the best they could. Most days the only two at home over long periods of time would be her and Caesar. Caesar, being the most level-headed of the siblings, took good care of his sister and often played with her in her violent and energetic way so she’d be happy. It also mostly meant that Zaira would return the gesture and let him choose what to do next, right according to the generosity and empathy her mother kept hammering into her head.

Zaira was at this time also starting to explore and broaden her horizons. Often in company of Caesar and Light, or at least one of them. This of course was still limited to only being allowed within town borders, but she was often found following the older children in town and Light’s friends as they either ventured into the jungle or to the mines. One of these adventures into the more dangerous areas nearby her home almost ended in disaster when she was just around six years old. The children had kept daring one another down in the mines to do seemingly harmless things like jumping between broken steps or see who dared to venture the furthest into areas where warning signs alerted of danger and warned to not pass beyond. This had been a popular game for a few months and at this day Zaira had followed Light and Caesar along with a few other of the children in town into the mines. Zaira, being the smallest and youngest, was taunted into a reckless attempt to venture into an unstable mine shaft. Not taking any warnings seriously, the two oldest around begun shouting and jumping to tease when it looked like the little girl was going to beat their attempt. Zaira had simply been too young, childish and reckless to know any better or be scared of stones and rubble lying around. No one realized the true danger until the children’s yells had instead started to draw the attention of a few dusk creatures nearby. With arrows suddenly flying over their heads, the children fled while screaming for help.

Luckily, Netha and the other miners were not far away and saved them that day. Though after previously having refrained from teaching her nagging daughter her own mother’s teachings with the sword, Netha had to admit to Amdis that it was best to at least teach her something. Thus, after some proper scolding and punishment, an overjoyed Zaira begun her training in defending herself since then. She received a wooden sword to practice with that got remade regularly to fit as she grew. She quickly begun carrying it around in a makeshift rope-belt around her waist.

The event itself had little other effect on Zaira than making her not trust the children in question and having her feel incredibly ashamed of her misbehavior. From then on, she was bit more careful with what mischief she was up to and at least sometimes tried to ask first if she was allowed to. Sometimes.

However, neither of her parents liked what they saw. Zaira’s violent trait seemed to be encouraged once they begun training her, and once the already quite strong girl was getting better at fighting it just started to get worse. Zaira was stronger than she thought and often hurt without meaning it. Once the talks about becoming a warrior like her grandmother started they quickly tried to discourage her and find her another interest. At the age of seven they let her come along to the mines to see how her mother worked, but she held little interest in it. Once that didn't work they let her spend her days with her father in the smithy. Relieved and glad as they saw Zaira show some interest in her father’s work they put her as his apprentice in hope she’d find it a possible future for herself. However, a dreamy Zaira watched her father create everything from weapons to pots while daydreaming of a childishly romanticized version of wars and battles.

7-10
Then one day there were new arrivals to Auria. Well, technically they were returning. They called themselves the Connors and arrived in a ship they called The Snow. They carried news of Zaira’s grandparents along with new tales to tell. Ezri Connors, the old ex-pirate and mother in the family, told quite a bunch of exciting and thrilling tales of Zaira’s grandmother. How her grandmother had alongside Conradian Larson lead a group of people through a desert and became Security Councilor and Guard Captain of a far away old town named Ravenna. That she had a little child, an aunt about Zaira’s own age that they named Estelle. The tales fascinated Zaira and she many times returned to the Connors’ home to hear them again.

Alongside with the drinking and cursing old pirate that Zaira quickly started to like there came two children for her and her brothers to play with. Bishop and Lapis. Bishop, with his dear cow surprisingly named Cow, she found a daring and exciting friend who was more wild than her own brothers. Whenever he dared her, she’d accept the challenge. Lapis, being closer to Zaira's own age, she became good friends with and called Queeny.

Zaira’s raw energy, impatience and inability to stand any nonsense combined with her violent nature and strength had poor Queeny end up with a few bruises now and then. Only partly because Ezri Connors took up to train the girls in swordsmanship together. Zaira’s own training had been basic and where she had strength, guts and never pulled her punches, Queeny had more finesse and technical knowledge. The girls got training each morning before the day begun and while Zaira’s parents did nothing to stop it, they certainly didn't entirely approve of this new source of encouraging Zaira to fight.

Over the years that passed, Zaira went on many adventures with her new friends and Queeny grew her best friend. They trained and they played together as they grew. Often listening to tales of their families’ adventures when the night had fallen and Queeny’s mother worked hard at the inn to provide the sailors with drinks. The laughter filling the room as the sailors gladly listened to the tales Ezri had to tell as well. Zaira learnt a bit of a foul language from Ezri, to her parents’ dislike, and the tales of her grandmother chasing sailors out of town had her start helping Ezri to get the thrown out sailors back to their ships with taunts, kicks and not-so-nice pokes with the tip of her wooden sword. Often aimed right at their rear as they swayed their way back to their captains to get scolded. Overall she had an exciting and rich life and despite her nagging at her parents of her dreams, she was happy with what she had.

During these years, the news of the end of the civil wars on the Mainland slowly but surely reached Auria. There’d been a notable decline in work for the miners of the town the past few years as the demands on supplies for weapons grew less. Once the news reached the town Netha had begun to worry, they all noticed the sudden change. Netha’s work hours grew less and also grew less demanding. As the town started having to fire the most recent hired or those they didn't need anymore, even the children begun to feel it. Parents lost their jobs and some of their friends since many years moved away. Zaira hoped along with the rest of the family that her mother had stayed long enough in the mines and were good enough to not lose her job. She didn't want to have to leave their home. This time around, they were in luck. Netha had been there longer than most and wasn't let go. Zaira was ensured there was nothing to worry about anymore once the last one had been let off, but it was kept from her that it was going to stay uncertain from there on.

Then, when she was nine years old, there was three firm knocks on the door one sunny autumn morning. Her mother screamed as she opened the door to find her parents standing outside and with tears and laughter the family, that they learned now was called Karalis and Zaira’s name got swiftly changed from Darl Spy to that, rejoined and met. For the first time in her life, Zaira met the grandparents she’d heard so many tales about and she looked up at them with awe. She couldn't ever had imagined them the way they actually were in reality.

Her grandfather seemed so stern. And smaller than she’d expected for someone that’d fit the tales she’d heard of him. She felt bit shy to go greet this old man with fine lines and a few grays, strangely keeping a hoe on his shoulder all the while, but the stern lines were softened by those warm loving eyes and that warm smile. There was pride there too. She’d always remember how he smelled of earth and dirt, his coarse hands and how she had to shyly ask if he was Spy or Caesar. To not mention how his mother and grandmother looked when she asked him. She liked him, he was very nice. His unshaven cheek scratched hers. His arms were stronger than they looked and she liked to sit in his lap and be held by them.

Her grandmother was also much smaller than she’d expected. Yet still, scary. The wild hair with its grays, all those scars were so many more than she’d imagined, and the weapons she carried with such ease and habit. Just her movements and gestures. There was something in the way she moved and even just stood or sat that had Zaira remain silent and watching, intimidated. Her grandmother didn't seem at all as nice as she’d heard she would be from Light and her mother. Once they were introduced and greeted and those red eyes studied her she felt nervous, what if she wasn't good enough? But just as with her grandfather, there was only warmth and pride. Though as they first met, her grandmother smelt of puke, sweat and some spice she couldn't put her finger on. As she frowned and pointed out that ‘grandma stinks’ they all laughed and it was explained to her that her grandmother needed a bath after spending several weeks feeling sick in the hull of a ship. Later, she’d instead note that her grandma mostly smelled of… well, still a bit of sweat, with a hint of her own mother’s bath oils. Her hands were also coarse, and her skin soft but uneven from all scars. Her hair was just like Zaira’s own. Wild, thick, fluffy, plus very fun to hide things in that were later discovered at the weirdest moments. Like when they fell into her grandmother’s soup at the dinner table.

Then there was her aunt, Estelle. That the girl just a few years older than herself was her mother’s sister was just weird and they looked quite alike. At least, that’s what everyone told them. She was very shy and was wearing such a pretty dress, like Queeny. Zaira herself had never had any dresses like that far as she knew. Her mother always said she kept destroying them and that she just had been too small for her to remember she used to have some. They shyly greeted, Zaira giving her a beaming smile, and later played a lot over the time they stayed. Together with Queeny of course.

A few weeks of joy and fun followed. With danger, excitement, amazing training sessions with her grandmother and Ezri and adventure as well, before she had to say goodbye when her grandparents carried on with their travels. She’d only get a brief few days more with them before they all left for this time, but the last day her grandmother passed by before returning to her own home in Ravenna they were told the strangest news.

The Dusk Portal had re-opened. As her grandmother told the kids of her travels, Amdis and Netha held a quiet conversation in the kitchen. Zaira was of course eagerly hearing her grandmother’s tales instead of worrying about the angry mutters and upset hisses from Netha, but something definitely had disturbed the peace of the home. Amdis, no longer a youth and certainly one who’d long ago sought to aid in the opening of the Portal and now felt inspired by the journey Zarkaylia had managed, held a desire to go to his home Realm. Long ago the couple had discussed this and it had then ended at the fact that Netha, as a half-blood, can’t go even if she wanted to leave her home and what she saw as her home Realm.

Nothing of this was openly spoken about until Zaira’s grandmother had already gone and the quiet fights became open ones. They weren't getting any less either. Once Zaira had gotten a new idea in her head they were only going to get worse. Zaira wished to learn how to be a warrior from her grandmother.

Thus, she begun to nag at her parents. She begun to protest and refuse to see her father at the smithy and she ran off to cause trouble in town. The months that followed were tough on the whole family and she grew less happy than she’d ever been before. Netha and Amdis watched with frustration and sadness as this all happened and how it, along with their own fighting about what to do in regards of the Portal, tore at the family and its internal relations. Zaira seemed to grow resentful and bitter towards her parents and they in turn ached inside to see it and to see her so unhappy. Light begun to stay out or away from his home for longer periods and Caesar grew quiet and distant. There’d had to be something done eventually. Zaira wanted to learn from her grandmother and she was bitter to not have it any other way. Other parents and children begun their complaints and Zaira herself injured and got herself injured more and more often in increasing amounts of fighting.

One day, her tenth birthday, her parents reluctantly gave her permission to go. It was her birthday gift. They hope that it would give them all some peace and in the long run heal the strained family-bonds. Overjoyed, yet saddened to say goodbye to Queeny and her family and friends, the preparations begun for her to leave. She brought with her a few belongings she had, supplies, and a letter to her grandparents from her mother. As the old pirate Ezri had gone and gotten herself more children and couldn't take Zaira to Ravenna, a captain with a crew was found that’d see to her getting safely and cared for to Ravenna. For a handsome fee.

Zaira was excited and joyful, yet at the day it was time to say goodbye and set sail she cried so much when she hugged them all and waved them off from the deck of the ship. From her mother she received a brown leather book with her name on the front as farewell gift. She promised to write and visit. Her father reluctantly gave her a small knife that he had made for her with a matching hilt. From her brothers she received gifts as well. Light had bought her a small and simple ornate copper bracelet and Caesar had, with some help from his mother, made her a stuffed toy cat. How could she do this? This was a terrible idea, she thought. How was she going to be able to make it without them. Already missing them all greatly she felt crestfallen already before she could no longer see her home. Zaira had never in her life been on her own like this… And she was afraid.